


A Thousand Words (Your Picture's Worth It)

by moonrise31



Series: once, twice, and again until it's over [28]
Category: TWICE (Band)
Genre: F/F, Soulmate AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-15
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:53:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25911658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonrise31/pseuds/moonrise31
Summary: In which Nayeon is looking for love, Sana has already found it, and Mina is slowly putting two and two together.
Relationships: Im Nayeon/Minatozaki Sana
Series: once, twice, and again until it's over [28]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/935700
Comments: 19
Kudos: 379
Collections: Shot Thru the Heart: A Writing Collection





	A Thousand Words (Your Picture's Worth It)

**Author's Note:**

> not angst i promise

Nayeon sends the distress message to their group chat just after Sana’s last Monday lecture. It’s only an hour or so past lunchtime, so there are now plenty of open tables outside the main cafeteria on campus -- not including the one Nayeon has chosen to claim with a decisive faceplant against the tabletop.

Sana is the last of their available friends to arrive; she slides easily into the open space next to Nayeon that Mina moves over to make. Jeongyeon and Jihyo have spread themselves out over the seats to Nayeon’s left, completing the semicircle of girls now staring somewhat blankly at the breakdown happening in their midst.

“So,” Jeongyeon finally says. “What’s all this about?”

Nayeon turns onto one cheek, forehead surprisingly unscathed from its excessive contact with the plastic surface her arms remain flung across. “My mark appeared today.”

Sana straightens, twisting her body as she searches the exposed skin of Nayeon’s neck and arms. “Really? Where?”

Nayeon sits up fully, hooking her index finger around the collar of her shirt and pulling down.

“Hey, what are you doing?” Jeongyeon jerks back, one hand raised to shield her face. 

“Relax.” Nayeon rolls her eyes. “It’s just my collarbone.”

“It’s safe,” Jihyo confirms, her amused grin shifting into something more thoughtful as she leans a little across the table to see. “What’s that? A wave?”

“Maybe,” says Nayeon, voice strained as she tries to look down her nose at it. “It’s just the outline so far.”

Sana agrees with Jihyo’s assessment: the sea-green strokes of a rising tidal wave are darkly visible against the paleness below the protruding wing of Nayeon’s collarbone. It’s barely begun, but Sana already thinks that it will be the prettiest mark she’ll ever see.

“It’ll fill out over time,” Jeongyeon says. She smirks as she claps Nayeon on the back. “Good for you, unnie. Finally ready for love, I see.”

“What are you talking about?” Nayeon grumbles as she lets her shirt collar spring back into place. “I’ve been ready for years.”

“Not like Sana,” says Mina, giving Sana’s shoulder a gentle nudge. “She’s had hers since high school.”

Everyone knows, already. But they look over anyway, and Sana also glances down at her own right arm. She flips it over to expose the inside of her wrist, where a delicate coffee-colored branch of cherry blossoms stretches towards her palm, and a scattering of soft petals floats gently in between the blue veins crisscrossing beneath her skin.

It’s a far cry from Nayeon’s rising mid-ocean current, but luckily no one else notices the soft twist in Sana’s smile.

“That’s just a theory,” Jihyo reminds them. “No one’s been able to prove what causes marks to appear when they do, or when to tell when they’re complete. It’s different for everyone.”

“Right,” says Jeongyeon. “So for Nayeon, it probably started because she finally realized that she’s not getting any younger, and --”

“Shut up.” Nayeon shoves Jeongyeon, almost driving her straight into Jihyo. “What about your mark, huh? You just got it a few weeks ago, and you still won’t show me.” Her eyes narrow. “Is it in some place embarrassing?” 

Jeongyeon scoffs. “You wish.”

“It is, isn’t it.” Nayeon’s smile grows devious, gaze sharpening as she leans closer. “Where is it, Yoo? On your butt cheek? Maybe an armpit?”

“Unnie!” Jeongyeon yelps as Nayeon’s fingers curl around the hem of her shirt. “Get away -- hey, get away from me!” 

Jihyo lets the two vigorously wrestle for a few more seconds before she sighs. “It’s just on her bicep.” 

“Oh.” Nayeon immediately sits back. “Why didn’t you just say so?” Jeongyeon rolls up her left shirt sleeve with a huff. Underneath, a hazy orange sun sets behind the mountain range painted above the crease of her elbow, the last lights of day highlighting the rocky crags with a golden pastel glow.

“It’s beautiful,” says Mina softly. 

“Yeah.” Sana pushes her bottom lip out into a pout. “It’s not fair. How come you get an amazing scenic view, and all I get are some wilting petals?”

“Please,” Nayeon says as she crosses her arms before looking back at Sana. “I’d take your cute pink flowers over some sun-warmed rock piles any day.” 

“Too bad you got a bunch of boring old seawater instead,” says Jihyo, laughing when Nayeon whips around to aim a rude gesture in her direction. Jeongyeon sticks out her tongue in return, and the three quickly fall into another squabble normally only witnessed on primary school playgrounds.

Which is just as well, since Sana isn’t usually one to be left speechless by someone who has so offhandedly expressed their preference for her soul over anyone else’s. It’s not even the first time Nayeon has made her chest flutter like petals in the wind; her wrist itches, and Sana rubs at it without looking. 

It doesn’t match Nayeon’s even a little, anyway.

“Jihyo,” Mina says suddenly, “How did you know where Jeongyeon-unnie’s mark was?”

Sana shoots the other girl a curious glance, because Mina is usually the last one to sow discord of any kind. But Mina only winks back at her. Meanwhile, Nayeon hits an even more indignant pitch as she gasps, “Park Jihyo, is that a stupid rock pile I see behind your ear?” 

It takes another ten minutes for a truce to be called among the three. And Mina weathers every second of it sitting beside Sana, giving her room to breathe.

-

Nayeon has already forgiven her two best friends for waiting literal weeks to tell her that they are actually each other’s fated other halves, but it’s the principle behind the betrayal that makes her offer to share her library study room reservation on Tuesday with the first-years instead -- in addition to Sana and Mina, of course.

Mina and Tzuyu are still in class on the other side of campus, so Nayeon can only distract herself from said studying by either watching Sana doodle in the margins of her reading notes, or trying to decipher the intricate hand motions Chaeyoung and Dahyun are throwing at each other in the modified game of rock-paper-scissors they’ve become aggressively immersed in.

Nayeon’s eyes idly pick out each of the small tattoos dotting Chaeyoung’s vigorously gesturing arm: the younger girl’s ammunition in the war she’s waging against the powers above for trying to decide what kind of art looks best on her body. And then there’s Dahyun, who speaks so little about herself that Nayeon is half convinced that her mark is already apparent, probably somewhere prominent like on her cheek or nose -- but deliberately hidden by well-applied makeup and the fact that Dahyun’s face contorts through at least ten infinitely more amusing expressions every minute of the day.

And then there’s Sana.

Nayeon catches a flash of fluttering pink in her periphery as Sana highlights a phrase in her notebook with a flourish. Sana has never been one for watches or bracelets or long sleeves. She leaves her wrist bare instead -- exposes it to the good, the bad, and much, much worse -- and still manages to keep her heart whole. 

The patch of skin below Nayeon’s collarbone itches, and she raises a hand to scratch at it.

“Don’t do that.” Sana pushes Nayeon’s arm back down without looking up from her notes. “It won’t make the rest of your mark come in any faster.”

“You don’t know that,” says Nayeon, but she drops her hand anyway. 

“If you scratch it enough, your tidal wave might become pink,” Chaeyoung breaks away from her showdown with Dahyun to suggest. “Then at least you’d match with Sana-unnie.”

Nayeon doesn’t say anything, because the thought of matching with Sana is far from the most terrible thing that’s crossed her mind today. 

But, Sana pouts. “That would be cheating the system.” This is when Nayeon remembers that their marks are already so, so different, and she begins to tap the tabletop as the itch beneath her skin returns with a vengeance.

“Who cares?” Chaeyoung shrugs. “Maybe the system sucks.”

“It’s still there for a reason,” Sana insists. “It ends up working for most people.”

Chaeyoung raises her eyebrows. “Majority rules? Is that really the hill you want to die on, unnie?”

“Leave her alone,” says Dahyun. “You’re just trying to stir up trouble because I’m owning you at this game.”

“That’s because you’re the one making up all the rules,” Chaeyoung fires back. Her eyes light up anyway, brow furrowed in concentration as she throws out scissors against… whatever three-fingered configuration Dahyun comes up with.

“Don’t worry, unnie,” Sana says. Nayeon quickly turns and meets her earnest gaze. “We’ll find your universe-approved match before you know it.”

It’s not immediate, but Nayeon manages to pull the corners of her mouth into a smile. “And we’ll find yours, too.”

Sana hums. “I wonder when Mina will get hers. Or do you think she has already, and just hasn’t told us yet?”

“You know that you’d be the first people she’d tell,” Dahyun butts in, just before she somehow loses the next matchup against Chaeyoung. She freezes, and then raises her hands slowly, tilting her chin up to stare wide-eyed at the ceiling as she mouths, _why_.

This is the scene Mina and Tzuyu walk into. Mina’s expression says something to the effect that she shouldn’t have expected anything else, and the fond smirk pushing Tzuyu’s dimple into existence admits that she’s much past being surprised. 

“Tzuyu! It’s been a while,” says Nayeon, throwing up her arms as Tzuyu walks behind her. Tzuyu neatly sidesteps the hug, making her way to the empty seat between Chaeyoung and Dahyun.

“You could’ve sat here, you know,” says Sana, patting the chair next to her as Mina takes the one beside Nayeon. 

“I know,” Tzuyu says. She calmly unzips her bag and takes out her notebook, setting it down in the space the other two first-years had so thoughtfully left clear of their own scattered papers.

Sana whines, slumping forward in an effort to get Tzuyu to meet her pleading gaze. Nayeon smiles absently as she props her chin in one hand and watches Tzuyu studiously ignore everything but the reading in front of her. Tzuyu is comfortably quiet, like Mina, but in a way that makes Nayeon think that Tzuyu might as well share marks with her family’s puppy back in Taiwan, for all the time she spends spamming their group chat with their photos together whenever she’s home -- and leaving everyone else’s messages on read otherwise.

“You only have this room reserved for another hour, unnie,” Mina softly reminds her. 

Nayeon turns quickly, shooting Mina a hasty grin. “Right, studying. I’m doing it, I promise!”

Mina smiles back at her, brief and delicate and blinding. And then it hits Nayeon: this warm and wonderful thing that shines so brightly from Mina, and from Tzuyu and the two weirdos now fake punching each other in the corner -- and from Sana. Nayeon looks down at her unfinished problem set, and wonders if it’s too much to ask the universe for each of her friends to find the happiness she’s always dreamed of. 

-

“I’m going to stop looking,” Nayeon declares on Wednesday. “For my soulmate,” she adds after a moment, because both Mina and Sana have taken a second too long to respond.

They’re sitting on a park bench close to campus, sipping their watermelon drinks through electric blue straws because the vendor had thought to give them matching colors. Nayeon had been on the verge of asking him for green ones instead, but Mina had pulled her away just in time; it’s enough that they’re indulging in her favorite out of all the ways to survive the early summer heat, so she doesn’t need her favorite straw color too. 

“That’s pretty sudden,” Sana finally says. “Why are you giving up already? Just because you haven’t met them yet doesn’t mean that you never will.”

“It’s only been a few days,” Mina agrees. “They aren’t going to just drop out of the sky as soon as your mark starts appearing.”

Nayeon shrugs, stirring her drink with her straw. The ice cubes clack together and against the plastic of her cup. “I know. So why should I focus all my energy on it now?” She leans forward, resting her elbow on her knee and turning so that she can see both Sana and Mina on the bench beside her. “I’m almost halfway through my last year at university, so I shouldn’t waste it on someone I might not even meet until I’m thirty. I’ve already met you guys, and I’d rather just enjoy my time with you.”

“Aw, unnie,” Sana coos, leaning over to rest her head on Nayeon’s shoulder. “I didn’t know you liked us that much.”

“Of course I do,” Nayeon scoffs, biting down on her straw before slurping loudly, as if it can prevent Mina from noticing her pinkening cheeks. “Anyway, I’m not actually giving up or anything. I’m just trying to be patient, like you guys keep telling me to be.”

Sana hums, lifting her head and straightening once more. Nayeon’s shoulders relax, and she releases her mutilated straw from between her teeth.

Mina looks down at her own drink, watching as a drop of condensation slides down the side of her cup to land on her knuckle. “I can’t believe you’re graduating already, unnie.”

Nayeon eagerly grabs onto the change in topic. “Yeah, remember when we first met, Minari?”

Now Mina feels her own face heating up, and she ducks away from Nayeon’s teasing stare. “It was for class, alright? I needed to take a photo for an assignment, and you were the only other person in the library.”

Sana snickers. “Yeah, and because the assignment theme was to find someone that embodies ‘inspiration’.”

Nayeon hits Sana with an exaggerated frown. “Are you saying I’m _not_ a perpetual guiding light for the coming generations?”

“You’re one to talk, Sana,” Mina readily adds. “Remember the first time you met Nayeon-unnie --”

“Yes, yes, the mutual spilling of lattes incident,” Sana cuts in quickly. “We can stop talking about this, now.”

“You do have to admit that we have most first encounter stories beat,” says Nayeon, and Sana allows a sheepish grin in agreement.

Mina doesn’t say anything, but that’s not out of the ordinary. So Nayeon doesn’t even spare her a glance when Mina only nudges Sana’s knee with hers to keep the older girl from rubbing at the branch cosmically inked onto her wrist. Then Nayeon stands up, offering her and Sana’s services in accompanying Mina back to her building before the late afternoon sun sets even further. 

During their walk to Mina’s apartment -- just off campus -- Mina pays less attention to their chatter than usual. It’s something she shouldn’t admit to doing often, but she likes listening to Nayeon’s and Sana’s voices more than to the words that they carry. And lately, she’s not sure what exactly has changed since Nayeon revealed her mark on Monday.

“Bye, Minari,” says Sana when they arrive. It’s pinched off at the edges: carefully contained, layered to prevent bursting. Not because of Mina, but because of --

Nayeon pulls Mina into a quick hug. “See you tomorrow,” she says, but her eyes follow Sana’s hands as they disappear into her pockets.

“Bye, unnies,” says Mina, as usual, and enters the building.

Although she’d lived in the campus dormitories for her first year, the one thing Mina finally allowed her parents to spoil her with was rent for a studio apartment. After all, she could only take so much of her roommates -- who may or may not have included Jihyo -- leaving for the day, only to come back later and ask out of concern why she hadn’t moved in eight hours. 

It takes Mina minutes to lock her door, toss her keys onto the kitchen counter, and make her way to the bathroom. Living alone has the added benefit of her not having to worry about inconveniencing anyone whenever she ends up taking a long shower, lost so much in her thoughts that she doesn’t notice when her fingers are beyond pruny and the entire bathroom is filled with steam.

Mina is thankful for many things in this place that is slowly becoming a home away from home, but especially for Sana and Momo, who had moved to Korea the year before and had taken Mina under their wing almost as soon as she’d stepped onto campus. Sana especially kept close, quickly slipping from doting mentor into the friend who knows exactly when Mina would like some company for the night, or some relief from holding secrets heavy enough to slide off of her chest only in the safety of the dark.

Sana has also, on occasion, called Mina in the hours when late night spills into early morning, or slept over to murmur her own buried thoughts into the warm sleepy air muffling the world beyond Mina’s living room floor. Which is why Mina knows that the first time Sana met Nayeon was actually at the international student orientation two years ago -- when Nayeon, in a blue student council t-shirt and holding two plastic water bottles, walked up to Sana and Momo with an easy smile and asked if either of them had any questions.

The secret that Sana had safely tucked into a corner of Mina’s memory that night is that Nayeon doesn’t remember this first day. How could she, when she’d talked with dozens of other Japanese students already, and had met even more while working all of the orientations the rest of the week? But Sana remembers, and the ache of it makes her wrist throb sometimes when she lets herself think too much about it.

Mina wonders if Nayeon has truly forgotten; it’s hard to tell what Nayeon feels in general, because she holds it all so close to her chest that not even her longest friends can see anything beyond what she chooses to show them. But Mina can’t get rid of the image of Nayeon sitting with Sana’s head on her shoulder: cheeks matching the watermelon in her drink and an electric blue straw dangling from her mouth, bent beyond use.

Mina shuts off the water. She steps out of the shower, patting her hair down before wrapping her towel around herself. Crouching, she pulls out one of the drawers under the counter in search of her hair dryer. The mirror is fogged over, but she straightens and reaches out to swipe away enough condensation to reveal her face and shoulders. 

As she turns to plug in the dryer, a dark spot on her right shoulder blade catches the corner of her eye in the mirror’s watery reflection. Mina pauses, lowering her hands and angling herself so that more of her shoulder is visible. 

She stares at the mark on her shoulder for a few seconds longer, and smiles.

-

Sana, Nayeon, and Mina are the only ones who have free afternoons on Thursdays, which usually leads to the three of them getting lunch together as soon as their morning classes are done. Today, Momo’s professor sends out a harried email cancelling lecture fifteen minutes before it’s due to start, but it works out well since Momo will never pass up a chance to have a meal.

“So,” Momo says around a mouthful of rice, “I heard that you got your mark, unnie.”

“Oh, right, you haven’t seen it yet.” Nayeon sets down her chopsticks before bringing her hand up to tug the collar of her shirt out of the way. “Most of the wave has come in now, I think.”

Momo rests her hands against the table and stands so that she can lean over and get a better look. “It’s pretty.”

Nayeon lets go of her shirt collar; Sana can’t help but watch it spring back into place, like a wall built up faster than it had been torn down. 

“You already have yours, right?” Mina says. “On your neck?”

Momo nods, dipping her head forward and brushing her hair to one side. “Most of it, at least. It’s in the back, so I’ve only seen it in photos.”

“Photos don’t do it justice,” says Sana, firmly. She gets up and rounds the table so she can stand beside Momo, who turns in her seat and lets Sana hold her hair back while Nayeon and Mina scoot closer.

“It’s so peaceful,” Nayeon murmurs, and Sana has to agree. The mark spreading across the nape of Momo’s neck is filled out mostly by a deep blue ocean lapping quietly at the edge of a sandy yellow shore. The beginnings of what looks like the frond of a palm tree are starting to edge in from the right, although the trunk is nowhere to be seen. 

“What is it?” Mina asks, and it takes Sana a moment to realize that she’s looking at Nayeon.

Nayeon is staring at Momo’s mark with an intensity Sana would surely disintegrate under. But there’s a flicker of something else, too -- like when Nayeon doesn’t score as well as she’d hoped on her last exam, or is worried that she’s hurt Mina’s feelings by taking a joke too far.

And then Nayeon says, “Do you think it could match mine?”

The question pulls something out and away from Sana: a receding tide that reveals only broken shells and dull clumps of seaweed, clogging Sana’s throat and leaving her mouth painfully dry.

“I don’t see it,” Mina says, hand resting gently on Sana’s back as she tilts her head, squinting. 

“Here.” Nayeon’s fingertip briefly brushes against skin, and Momo grumbles about the tickling. “It’s like the crest of my tidal wave, right?” She pulls down her collar again, and Sana glances over even though she knows she already can’t bear to look.

“Momo’s are probably clouds,” says Mina, after a few moments. “And the ocean doesn’t match.”

“The color could change.” Nayeon drops her hand, and glances back at Momo’s neck. “The wave could be a gradient, or something, so mine might turn more blue when the bottom fills in.”

“Maybe,” Mina says. “We should probably wait.”

Nayeon nods, still staring intently even as she straightens, both hands now tucked safely into the pockets of her jeans.

Sana is afraid to speak. She lets Momo’s hair fall back into place, and Momo spins in her seat to face them. “What if we’re really soulmates, unnie?”

Nayeon narrows her eyes. “Why do you sound so worried?”

“I’m not,” Momo says quickly. “I’m just asking.”

Nayeon thinks for a deliberate second, and then shrugs. “It wouldn’t be the worst thing.”

Momo’s bottom lip juts out. Nayeon throws her head back in a loud laugh, pitching forward to gather Momo up in her arms and press their cheeks together, snickering soft assurances. Momo’s mouth curves easily into her usual grin, and it’s this that makes Sana finally look away even as the hand Mina has around her waist gives her an understanding squeeze.

Sana doesn’t need to see. Because ever since Momo had admitted that not knowing what her mark looks like bothers her, sometimes, Sana had promised to know every ripple on that calm blue ocean and every speck dotted into that wide shore of sand. It’s the least she can do, after all, for the person who welcomes absolutely everyone with a blind eye and open arms, yet still reserves a spot just for Sana that only the very best of friends can fill.

So Sana knows Momo’s mark better than she knows her own, but she doesn’t know Nayeon’s at all. She doesn’t know if the swirling white foam softening the crest of Nayeon’s tidal wave is the same as the puffy white clouds drifting lazily under the wisps of Momo’s hair, and she doesn’t know if the brilliant sea green splashing its way slowly across the skin above Nayeon’s heart will eventually dissolve into the deep azure that stretches across the expanse between the tops of Momo’s shoulder blades. 

Momo and Nayeon are two of the most important people in Sana’s life, but she’s never had to consider how important they could be in each other’s.

Somewhere seemingly much farther than from across the table, Momo asks if Mina is going to finish her lunch. Sana shuts her eyes as Nayeon offers her leftover chocolate bar, because Sana is afraid to know just how well Nayeon and Momo are meant to match.

Her wrist itches, and not even the coolness of Mina’s fingers wrapping around to cover her trembling branch of petals can stop it.

-

It’s just Nayeon and Mina idling on the bench after classes today, at least for now. Sana has classes later on Fridays, so they wait in the park until she’s done. Then they sip on Mina’s favorite watermelon drink and walk her to her apartment, and afterwards Nayeon walks with Sana back to her dorm on campus before catching the evening bus home.

Mina will always be Nayeon’s favorite. But every time they walk back to campus from Mina’s apartment building, the air collapses into a bubble just around Nayeon and Sana, so that Nayeon can’t think or see or breathe anything else. And the light in Sana’s eyes whenever she catches Nayeon looking has always sparked a different kind of protectiveness into curling at the bottom of Nayeon’s gut. 

“You’ve been doing that a lot, lately.”

Nayeon blinks, shaking herself out of the thoughts she hadn’t noticed herself sinking into. “What do you mean?” She asks Mina, because she really doesn’t know: has she been zoning out, playing with her shirt collar, thinking about Momo, worrying about Sana? 

Nayeon drops her hand from her collarbone, and sighs.

“You’ve been doing a lot of _that_ ,” says Mina. She thinks for a moment, and then adds, “It sounds like you have a lot that you don’t know how to say.”

Nayeon clears her throat. Mina has always been unnervingly perceptive, but she rarely reminds them of it. So Nayeon isn’t sure what to make of this sudden bluntness, even as she watches Mina precisely construct every syllable behind her lips before she speaks.

“Is it Momo?”

Nayeon has already been caught off guard, so she can’t muster up any response besides a heavy pause, followed by a defeated nod. “Maybe.”

Mina hums, shifting closer on the bench. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Nayeon sometimes forgets how much she really enjoys walking with Sana, whether it’s from Mina’s place or to their respective lectures in adjacent buildings. Their favorite filler for the rare silences between them is to kick at stray pebbles along the way, watching them skitter against the sidewalk cement ahead before bouncing into the street or skipping into the grass. Sana always lets out a giggle, sometimes a delighted laugh; and with each one, Nayeon’s heart swells into the tidal wave crashing just below her collar bone.

Nayeon doesn’t know how long she’s felt like this -- only that it had taken a literal sign from the universe permanently etching itself into her skin for her to realize there was no looking the other way, anymore.

“I’ve waited for my mark to appear for years,” Nayeon finally says. “I’ve wanted to find my soulmate for just as long. And I like Momo, I really do.” She hesitates, and then slowly says, “But I don’t think I want our marks to match.”

Mina tilts her head. “Why not?”

Nayeon searches for the right words. She scuffs her shoe against the asphalt path beneath their feet, but there aren’t any stray rocks to dislodge. “It scares me. That I might match with Momo.” She shakes her head and laughs, short and disbelieving. “I’ve wanted this moment for every second, for all this time. I’ve wanted it so badly that I’m always dreaming about it, always wishing for this stupid, abstract thing. Then I find out my soulmate might actually be a girl I already know and would do just about anything for, and I’m _scared_.”

Mina looks down, eyes following the arc of her swinging foot. “Are you afraid because you like someone else?”

Nayeon’s fingers slip from where they’ve already found purchase again in the collar of her shirt. She quickly returns her hand to her lap; and the strength of her reflex to reach up once more, to touch that splash of color practically burning through the fabric insistently covering it, startles her. Mina slowly reaches over, wrapping Nayeon’s hand in hers. 

Nayeon doesn’t move. Above them, a breeze blows past, and carries Mina’s question away with it. The leaves in the trees above them rustle softly, a few departing from their branches to drift down in lazy circles. They are green, but all Nayeon can see are cherry blossoms.

“Unnie?”

“Can I tell you something?” Nayeon asks, and Mina is still in the middle of nodding when she continues, anyway. “Sana and I running into each other at the cafe and spilling our coffees was not the first time we met.”

Mina waits a beat before asking, “Really?”

Nayeon nods. “It was actually -- I volunteered at all the new student orientations that summer, right? Including the international student ones. And Sana -- Momo must’ve been there too, but I don’t -- anyway, I went over to talk to her and just be friendly.” Nayeon pauses, laughing because the weight is finally leaving her heart and there is nothing to keep its beat from quickening, to keep it from rising all the way into her throat and screaming the words her tongue hasn’t been able to for so long. “But even then Sana was just -- she’s just. You don’t forget her, even if you just talk to her once, or even if she just looks at you for a second and maybe gives you half a smile. You know?”

Mina chuckles, facing the front once more. Her hand squeezes Nayeon’s. “I know.”

“But her mark isn’t mine,” Nayeon finishes quietly.

Mina’s thumb runs across her knuckles.

“Her mark isn’t mine, but Momo’s could be.” Nayeon sighs, slouching against the back of the bench. “So maybe Chaeyoung is right, about how the universe knows shit and the system is worse than your daily newspaper horoscope.”

Mina leans back, too. “Do you really think so?”

“The powers above being wrong about me is one thing.” Nayeon stares at the fallen green leaves -- she can see the sheen on them from here, and imagines them bending crisply between her fingers. “Momo, of all people, should have someone who can love her back.” 

Mina’s light, clear laugh is the last thing Nayeon expects to hear. 

She shifts, turning to face the other girl. “What’s so funny?”

“Nothing,” says Mina, a smile still curving her lips. Then she clears her throat, expression straightening. “When I say that Momo will be okay, could you trust me on that?”

Nayeon frowns. “How do you know?” 

Mina winks. “The universe told me.”

“Mina,” says Nayeon, voice rising with her indignation. She sits up, hand flipping so she can grab Mina’s fingers before they slip away. “What are you saying?”

“Let’s make a bet,” Mina says instead of answering. “If it turns out that Momo isn’t your soulmate, you have to buy me watermelon drinks until you graduate.”

Nayeon blinks. “But I’m already buying them for you.”

“Then you have nothing to lose,” says Mina, grin wider than ever.

Nayeon stares for another moment, and then nods. “Fine. But how do you --” 

“Look, there’s Sana.” Mina stands up, pulling Nayeon to her feet as well. Mina waves, and Sana’s figure across the park is already waving back.

Nayeon’s breath catches in her throat. But then she raises her hand too, and the terrible itch in her heart, again, becomes a buried worry to unearth another time.

-

Nayeon and Sana stay over on Saturday night, after showing up on Mina’s front doorstep and insisting that she can maintain her weekend homebody habits perfectly well while also in their company. They’ve brought takeout and snacks and extra controllers for Mina to beat them at literally every video game with, so Mina lets them in.

Currently, though, Nayeon has commandeered the television so they can watch a movie together; Sana brings a bowl of fresh popcorn from the kitchen. She plops into the empty space on the couch beside Mina, effectively sandwiching the younger girl between her and Nayeon. 

Nayeon hits play, and Sana holds out the bowl. She shakes it in front of Mina as she picks out a few pieces to toss into her own mouth. Once Mina has scooped up her handful, Sana extends the bowl across her lap so that it’s within Nayeon’s reach.

A flash of white suddenly catches Mina’s eye, and she holds out a hand for Sana’s arm. “What’s that? Your mark.”

Sana turns to look at her, cheeks full of popcorn. “My wha--?”

Mina tugs Sana’s arm closer, flipping it over to expose her wrist. Mina runs her thumb over the white puffs that have formed underneath the branch of falling cherry blossom petals. “When did this happen?”

Sana blinks, looking down as she swallows her mouthful of popcorn. “Oh, I didn’t see that.”

“How could you not notice?” Nayeon is leaning over Mina’s shoulder, practically pressed against Mina’s back as she tries to get a better look.

Sana huffs. “It’s not my fault that it’s been the same for years, and has only decided to change now.” She raises her wrist, and Mina lets it slip out of her grasp. Sana squints closely at the new additions. “What do you think they are?”

“Clouds, maybe?” Nayeon immediately suggests -- and the last piece that has been hovering over the puzzle of the past week finally clicks into place inside Mina’s head.

“Or,” says Mina slowly, “the crest of a tidal wave?”

The other two both lean back to stare at Mina, a merged chorus of “What?” and “Really?” ringing in the living room more loudly than probably intended.

“Just look,” Mina says. She whips around to face Nayeon, the rush of finally understanding the universe buzzing hotly in her ears. “Please?”

Nayeon hesitates, and then reaches up to pull down her shirt collar. Mina shifts to look back at Sana, staring expectantly until Sana leans forward and carefully holds her wrist next to the newly exposed skin.

“There,” says Mina, grinning as she sits back to glance between the other two. “You see that, right? It’s a perfect match.”

Sana has frozen, and hasn’t blinked since the back of her hand had quickly brushed against Nayeon’s collarbone, only to be jerked back twice as fast. Nayeon is admittedly having a harder time given her angle, tilting her chin in different ways to try and look past her nose. “Is it?” She asks Sana, voice strained and quiet.

Sana swallows. “But Momo,” she murmurs. “What about Momo?” 

“Oh, right.” Mina nudges Sana to get her to retract her arm. Then Mina shifts up enough on the couch cushion so that she has room to shrug off her flannel, leaving her only in a thin-strap tank top. She leans forward, resting her elbows on her knees to show her back. “I got my mark a couple of days ago.” 

Sana gasps, because she’s on Mina’s right and is first able to spot the calm waves and balmy yellow beach spreading across Mina’s shoulder blade. And it’s been hard for Mina to see everything clearly in the mirror, but she knows that there is definitely a fully grown palm tree, too, complete with strips of fluffy white clouds innocently floating along despite all the trouble they have caused.

“How come you didn’t say anything?” Nayeon pouts as Mina straightens. “You’ve been sitting on this for days and haven’t told anyone?”

“I told Momo right after we had lunch with her,” Mina admits. “But I asked her not to tell anyone else yet, because we didn’t know how you were feeling about everything.”

Nayeon slouches into the far corner of the couch. “My own friends, actively conspiring against me. I can’t believe it.”

Mina huffs. “It was in your best interest, unnie. Will you believe me now when I say that your mark and Sana’s are the same?”

Sana has resorted to staring blankly at the paused scene on the television. “You and Momo,” she whispers. “So that really means…” She looks down at her wrist. 

Mina glances down, too. Her eyes widen -- because she hasn’t ever been able to watch as the universe paints its mark onto skin-tight canvas. Nayeon shifts closer again when she sees them still and staring, and gasps over Mina’s shoulder as she sees the green-blue of her tidal wave brush onto Sana’s skin, filling out underneath the white frothing crest, and spilling across Sana’s wrist to catch a few of the soft pink petals scattered by the wind. Then Mina looks back up to see Sana, and how the years of longing fall off her shoulders as she rises on the tallest swell the entire ocean has to offer. 

“Unnie,” Sana says, and Nayeon’s head immediately snaps up to meet her gaze. Sana reaches out, and her next question is so faint that Mina can barely hear it. “Are they the same?” 

Nayeon doesn’t even twitch as Sana hooks a careful finger on her already wrinkled collar, and gently tugs downwards. A thin coffee-colored branch is now outlining the hard edge of Nayeon’s collarbone, and Mina watches as spots of pink blossom along it and flutter off to meet Nayeon’s rising current.

“They’re the same,” Nayeon whispers, eyes catching Sana’s instead of straining to look past her nose. And that’s as good an apology, confession, confirmation as any -- each syllable Nayeon lets past her lips escaping from the depths of her heart from even before she’d thought to keep them hidden there.

Sana doesn’t answer, her gaze pointedly shifting to watch Nayeon’s mouth move. Which is a good time, Mina thinks, to clear her throat and remind the two of them that she’s still very much stuck in between.

The two of them immediately lean back again. “Sorry,” Nayeon offers over Sana’s slightly surprised, “Oh, Minari.” 

Mina doesn’t try to hold back the grin already pushing at her cheeks. “Don’t be sorry. But I suggest continuing this somewhere else besides on my couch?” She pauses. “You could sleep over tomorrow night instead, or next week.”

Nayeon rolls her eyes, scoffing. And her ears are burning red still, but Mina appreciates her sincerity. “As if we’d cancel this very important sleepover for something silly like our quickly budding romance.”

Sana nods vigorously, stare clearing of the haze Nayeon had apparently cast over them. Then she smiles slyly at Mina, her eyes sharpening in a way that promises Mina nothing but mischief until the next morning, at the very least. “Besides, we have lots of other things to talk about, right?”

The night passes as Sana and Nayeon take turns needling Mina about her soulmate, claiming their rights as Momo’s best friend and best unnie, respectively. And in the hours just early enough in the morning to loosen tongues, Nayeon declares that Mina is still their favorite, and any time she feels like a third wheel will result in Nayeon buying her watermelon drinks for life. 

It had never been near the top of Mina’s list of worries, but hearing Sana’s adamant affirmation on top of Nayeon’s aggressive insistence warms the smile already on Mina’s face.

Mina walks the two to the front entrance of her apartment building late Sunday morning, just before the clock hits noon. And if she happens to catch Sana’s right hand slipping into Nayeon’s left as they make their way down the block, idly kicking pebbles and sometimes leaning in so closely that they must be able to feel the heat of the flush in each other’s cheeks, Mina will just take it as further evidence that for all that has changed, nothing much has changed at all.

**Author's Note:**

> Friendly stalkers only pls @moonrise31


End file.
